


Vices

by RedIrisRose



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Alternate Universe - Flower Shop, Alternate Universe - High School, Angst and Humor, Attempt at Humor, Cigarettes, Dark Character, Dark Past, Drugs, Flower Child Niall, Flower crows, Fluff and Angst, High School, Love, Love/Hate, M/M, Punk Zayn, Punk flower child, Robbery, Skateboarding, Zayn-centric, side larry - Freeform, ziall
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-08
Updated: 2014-07-08
Packaged: 2018-02-07 23:41:00
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,368
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1918527
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RedIrisRose/pseuds/RedIrisRose
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Zayn has a lot of vices: drug, alcohol, stealing and his newest vice- Niall Horan. <br/>It all started pretty innocently. Zayn was stealing; Niall just wanted to find the right classroom. The two were total opposites, Zayn was covered in tattoos and piercings. Niall on the other hand was totally untouched by ink or needle with his sand meets shore hair, done up in a daisy flower crown. <br/>Zayn hated the world and everyone in it after his parents broke up and he was stuck with his alcoholic father. Niall on the other hand loved everyone and everyone loved him.<br/>Niall Horan made Zayn question everything about his life within a matter of chance encounters and no matter how much he says he hates the stupid blond haired boy with his flower crows and contagious laugh fate keeps pushing them towards each other.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Vices

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Bravefunhopelove](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=Bravefunhopelove).



> Based on the prompt  
> 'just a one shot about Ziall... Zayn has had a hard life and sorta turned a big punk, Niall was an innocent flower child that everybody loved. Zayn thought he envied Niall, but turns out he's sort of a massive softie deep inside in love with the boy with the sky blue eyes'

Resist it, and your soul grows sick with longing for the things it has forbidden to itself, with desire for what its monstrous laws have made monstrous and unlawful- Oscar Wild

 

The first time Zayn met Niall was a day like any other. Zayn hasn’t known the taste of air without some form of poison since he was fourteen. It started simply with cigarettes but slowly worked its way up to packets a day, then a spliff a day, moving on to two or three. It was his vice, his way of killing out the pain that grew and throbbed inside his chest relieving the pain by killing everything. Toxic poisons aren’t judgmental. They kill everything inside you, good or bad. It eats away at the fibres and stiches of your very being, while also plugging up the visible holes, eating you from the inside out.

He was on his third cigarette midway through Monday afternoon glaring at the blank backdrop of brick building on the grounds of City of London, an all boys private school. This building was simply called the Smith.

Not that anyone really gave a damn what it was called. The naming of buildings in school was to no one’s benefits but the rich benefactors pouring money into the school for one reason or the next just to get their name printed on a stupid plaque at the side of a building no one cared about to feel like they are contributing to the ‘school community’, either that or trying to bump up their kid’s grades. Either way Zayn had a strong loathing towards them.

His fingers slowly worked at removing the small silver plaque for no reason other than a kind of yearning for defiance that welled inside of him. This was one of Zayn’s well-known and trusted instincts, his lack of empathy towards authority figures or any kind of rules in general.

 He wasn’t always like this of course but circumstance had shaped him to know no other way than this. Nature verse nurture had always been the question asked by many of his teachers during his twelve years of schooling. None of them knew anything about the hell-like home he lived in.

When he was five his parents split up. At first it had seemed like a relief, he wouldn’t have to live with the constant fighting or the times when his father in a drunken haze would strike his mother and scream foul names, his young mind could not comprehend. This was hard for a five-year-old to take in.

It was only when his mother and three sisters moved out the effect of the break up hit him like a tone of bricks. His father was nothing like his mother. His mother was soft, reserved. She would spend most of her days with him and his sisters, singing to them, reading to them. In summary she was the perfect mother or at least in Zayn’s mind she was.

His father on the other hand was the total opposite. He worked from eight until five, six days a week, though Zayn would be lucky to see him at home by ten. When he did arrive home he was often drunk. From a young age Zayn leaned to take care of himself and his father.

His father would normally stumble home where Zayn would have dinner already made and a cup of coffee ready to try and sober him up to little prevail. He would normally end up passed out in front of the telly with a mindless sting of infomercials playing.

Zayn would avoid his house like the plague. No one understood what it was like to live in the house full of the ghosts of empty memorise, his room being his only safe place.

The walls were filled with his art along with street signs and plaques. He didn’t really know where the obsession started, probably from Louis’s influence.

Louis was Zayn’s best mate. The older lad had a fair mean streak of his own. He smokes joints and skipped class almost at equal par with Zayn. The only difference is that Louis seemed to do it for the thrill. Zayn did it because he knew no other way to live.

~>>✤<<~

The first time Louis and Zayn had stolen anything substantial was on the first day of high school- for Zayn anyway, it was Louis’s second year. The two of them had been walking home at around ten after spending the rest of the evening at the skate park when Louis had paused under the traffic lights his blue eyes glint with mischievousness. Zayn wasn’t entirely sure where they were though he knew it one of the worse neighbourhoods, considering no one was out after dark. There were no lights other than those from the street lamps and the red traffic light flicking on and off, looming over their heads. Louis cast a glance over at Zayn softly muttering,

“You know when my dad was fourteen he and his mates stole a traffic light?”

Zayn glanced over his brow raised wondering for a second _how_ someone could steel a traffic light.

“How did they not get caught?” Zayn chuckled looking back over Louis who simply shrugged.

“It was the seventies, the cops were all high as fuck and surveillance camera didn’t exist.”

He nodded a little and watched the small boy start to shimmy his way up the pole his legs wrapped tightly around it and his eyes grew wide.

“What the hell are you doing?”

“What does it look like? I’m showing my dad I’m just as much of a bad arse as he was. Now help me out, yeah?”

For a second Zayn was faltered but still ran to Louis lacing his fingers together and lifting him up with both hands.

“Why do you always try to be like that prick? Didn’t he leave you guys… or go to prison or whatever the hell happened?”

For a second Zayn could feel Louis tense before pushing off his hands and shimmying up to the top of the pole using the weight of his backpack to try and stabilise himself.

“I don’t try to be like him. I try to be better than him,”

Louis scoffed while straddling the pole, his hands reach down into his backpack and slowly removes bolt cutters to Zayn’s amazement.

“Did you just drag me here to help you steal something?” He spluttered his dark eyes widened.

“No you twat, I came here to have an alibi and someone to blame, as well as someone to actually help me get this thing down.”

Zayn was in the proses of shaking his head while Louis began to slow and pain staking proses of cutting into the metal. Zayn started to panic slightly. It wasn’t a secret that between the two, even though Zayn was a year younger he was also ten times smarter.

“Louis what the hell are you going to do when that thing falls down? You’re just going to wreck it and make a fuss”

Louis paused mid way through his whole body tensing as if he really hadn’t thought this through.

“I… shit-“ Maybe Louis hadn’t thought it through.

 “Zayn go get a trolley from the shops across the road and we can wheel it to yours, no offence but your dad won’t notice either way… right?”

For a second Zayn was about to walk away, the thirteen-year-old had no desire to steal a shopping trolley just to help his best mate steal a bloody traffic light. It seemed utterly crazy.

Still with bated breath and gritted teeth he rushing into the closest supermarket. He brought enough to look like he didn’t _intend_ to steal anything before rushing off taking the trolley across the street just as Louis began to cut into the very last inch of metal, it was dangling by the skin of it’s teeth and a few scrap wires. Louis was supporting half the weight trying to lower in down.

Zayn stood in the middle of the trolley trying to keep it even while Louis started to slowly lower the weigh down to Zayn before cursing and dropping it. It wasn’t as heavy as Zayn would have thought, around twenty pound or so but it still almost caused the trolley to fly out from under him. He gritted his teeth and set it down looking over at Louis. Having fallen flat on his back from the pole.

“What the hell happened?” Zayn panted letting the light down in the trolley.

“The fucking thing electrocuted me!” he spluttered causing Zayn to let out a dry laugh.

“Are you fucking satisfied?” he scoffed looking to the older lad who gave a curt nod.

“You should be thanking me, I got you a new room ornament Malik.”

And that’s when his new vice started.

~>>✤<<~

Now back to the day Zayn met Niall. After plying the plaque from its place and sliding it into his backpack there was a barley audible muttered from behind him the accent dripping thick with Irish charm.

“Excuse me… You wouldn’t ‘appen to know where the Smith building is would you?”

Zayn tried to fight a smirk as he spun on his heel and sucked his lip ring between his teeth. His eyes met anther pair, bluer than the sky, a boy with milky white skin. His hair blond tipped, with hints of brown near the roots, this mess of sand meets shore hair was all done up together with a small string of daisies.

Really looking at the two they were polar opposites. Normally Zayn wore skinny, black jeans and leather while Niall fit comfortably is loose fitting blue jeans and a tank top, though that day they where both in the same matching black trousers and white, long sleeve dress shirt. Zayn’s whole completion, his hair, eyes and skin were all a fairly muted brown where as Niall was pale white with blond hair and brilliant blue eyes. Zayn skin was littered with tattoos and piercings while Niall was pure and untouched by any form of needle or ink. 

“Oh- that would be this building here… they should have it signposted better, hey?” Zayn asked with a devilish smirk.

The other boy let out a laugh his blue eyes lighting up as he gave a shy nod. His laugh was infectious, the kind that made Zayn want to laugh too, though for no apparent reason.   
“Right, silly me” he noted and when to rush off but paused, spinning back on his heels and casting a look a Zayn.

“’t’anks by the way, I’m Niall, I should probably tell m’brother I’m here.”

Zayn let a small smirk pass his lips and whispered,  
“I’ll be seeing you around Niall.”

The blond boy nodded going to rush across campus to another lad, slightly older with light brow hair holding his backpack. He had with wide smile when looking at his little brother. It was a look of fondness. It was a look Zayn had rarely been of the receiving end of, besides seeing his mother and sisters for Christmas and birthdays. Even those looks were becoming less as less warm as he aged and they all grew apart. Niall was almost there when he paused and looking back at Zayn.   
“Well now you have to tell me your name.”  
Zayn simply smirked and shook his head ever so slightly.

“No I don’t I’ll lose my air of mystery, I’ll talk to you later” he noted and waved as if shooing him off.

He could tell this boy was going to be fine, he was fit, likable and if nothing seemed to have a pretty good family life. Zayn tried to shake off the bubbles of envy that rose in his chest.

That was it. Something so simple had changed Zayn life forever that something simple came in the form of a blond haired Irish boy in a daisy crown.

~>>✤<<~

Months past in the blink of an eye and things changed for Niall. He had gone from being the new kid to being one of the most popular boys in the school but not because he was on the football team, or because he was overly blunt and snide like most of the other boys Zayn would consider as ‘popular’.

Niall was something different all together, everyone like Niall and when he says everyone he meant _everyone._ Zayn didn’t get what was so special about the lad, he would watch him as he came into the common room or the dining hall, seeing how he somehow managed to talk to everyone, make everyone laugh or smile. Most days he carried a guitar around like a fifth limb, always attach to it playing mindless tunes as they walked down the hallways with a flower crown in hair still.

The dude was unbelievable really.  Everyone had been taken in by his little act, including Louis.

As the two of them sat, joint lit, hiding in one of the old classrooms now mostly used for storage space Louis looked over at him and muttered,

“You know we should ask Niall to hang out with us here sometime.”

Zayn froze, jaw clenched his took another long drag of the spliff and rolled his eyes over at Louis.   
“He’s a pussy Lou, he wouldn’t break into a classroom and smoke a joint”

To this Louis gave the smallest of nods then leaned back in his seat,

“Maybe we could go sit with them at lunch then”

Zayn shot him his classic ‘are you crazy,’ look before shaking his head.  
“Why are you so obsessed with Niall all of a sudden?”  
“Why do you hate the kid?”  
Both fell silent for a second then Louis stood, the seat making a scratching sound as he did so. He then let out a long huff and snuffed out his joint,

“I’m not, okay? I just wanted to hang out with one of his mate.”

Zayn cocked a brow and muttered, “Then why not ask him.”

“There was… an incident.”  
This got Zayn’s attention, he snuffed out his own joint and sat up straight a smirk crossing his face as if to say, ‘do tell’.

“Well… you know I have a big mouth sometimes-“  
“Sometimes?” Zayn scoffed earning a sideways glare.

“Okay, all the fucking time, now anyway like I was saying… Well his name’s Harry, he’s Niall’s best mate and he’s really fit… I mean _really_ fit and he was running laps on the common and I just… kind of let it slip”

Louis buried his face in his hands as if trying to supress some utterly horrible memory while Zayn raised a brow.

“What did you say?” He pushed and Louis hung his head.

“I said his arse looked really fit in his shorts and he could shag me any day… then he ran past and he was looking right at me with his mother fucking green eyes and it was utterly mortifying.” He blushed- yes Louis Tomlinson actually blushed.

“Why don’t you just talk to him then? Let him know you’re not a pervert.”

Louis groaned letting his head fall onto the table as he sat back down,

“But I am a pervert” he whined with a small chuckle.

“Plus I tried, he works a bakery and literally over the past month I have eaten my weight in Danish pastries trying to get up the nerve to talk to him and wherever Niall goes he goes so you are just going to have to suck it up Malik and help me get in this lads pants” He noted a pleading look on his face.

“I am not eating in the dining room Louis, you will have to kill me and I mean that whole heartedly.”

Louis let out a groan then stood, a smile shaping it’s way onto his face and hopped excitedly from one foot to the next.

“What about the skate park? We can take them there after school- come on Zayn” he practically begged and after a long moment of silence Zayn gritted his teeth and nodded,

“Fine but don’t expect me to be nice to him.”

“I wouldn’t expect any less”

~>>✤<<~

Zayn decided to ignore the fact that Niall Horan even existed. He sat with a tin of spray paint mindlessly, his teeth grinding together whenever the blond boy would pass strumming his guitar or trying to make a flower crown with small wildflowers near the skate park.

Louis and Liam were skating while Harry watched and Niall cycled between sitting with Harry and skating with the other lads. Zayn might be able to deal with that until Niall plonked himself down next to Zayn looking over the work he had been doing on the skate park wall. He would use stencils and spray cans to create a kind of mural on the blank wall behind the half-pipe and kicker-ramp.

At the moment he was creating a rose appearing through a crack in the wall. Zayn wasn’t sure where the idea had sprung from, he just liked the idea of something beautiful able to thrive and escape something bleak and tragic. It was an image he often sketches in his notebook during lessons.  

“It’s pretty,” the blond lad mutters causing Zayn to meet his gaze.

“I guess”

Zayn was trying to ignore him, to act indifferent but there was no way he could do this when the lad sitting in front of him was so utterly dependant on pestering him.

“You still didn’t tell me your name” Niall added looking up at Zayn with a small wavering smile, he was hopeful, Zayn realised.

“And I won’t… look you might have everyone else food but not me. Not everyone can like you, you’re just a lying and a tourist with no set personality, you just want to be popular and act sweet so people can’t see through your fucking egotistical ruse. “ Zayn spat and then stood up yelling over to Louis,

“I’m going to go home, have fun with your new friends.”

Niall looked utterly shocked, the poor boy’s face fell. He looked as if he had physically been shoved, his mouth hung slightly agape.

Not even Zayn really knew why he did it, maybe he was scared that he was going to lose his only friend or maybe it was just the fact that something about Niall Horan set him off. He would be happy if he could just avoid the blond haired brat from the rest of his life, but fate had other planes.

~>>✤<<~

Mr Patterson always hatted Zayn and Louis, well especially Louis but Zayn had it pretty bad too. Once when the two were talking in the back of the classroom he managed to throw a wicked shot, flinging a copy of Julius Cesar across the classroom missing both their heads my mere inches.

That and a hand full of detentions every term goes to show that neither Zayn nor Louis were ever going to be in Mr Patterson’s good books.  So when he was a picking partner for the upcoming book reports Zayn and Louis knew there was no hope of being in the same group.

If you were wondering how Zayn and Louis ended up being in the same class the simple answer is that Mr Patterson _really_ hated Louis, so much so he managed to convince the principle that he needed to retake junior English.

So when settling them in pairs it wasn’t a surprise when Louis got paired with some smug preppy boy sitting in the back of the class while Zayn got picked with the one person he was trying to avoid, now half from hatred, half from shame still unsure how the school had fallen for the blond boy’s ruse. Probably the flower crown, he decided.

He gritted his teeth and moved his chair over to Niall’s desk seeing the boy’s eyes flutter to him and widen,

“So that’s your name” Niall whispered quietly looking still genuinely hurt from their last encounter and something like guilt churned around in his stomach.

“Yeah… that’s it,” whispered softly glaring down at the desk gritting his teeth and drumming his fingers over the table top.

“Look, I’m sorry for being a right twat, okay? Can we just not talk about it again” Niall gave a cut nod lacing his fingers together shyly, a blush rising in his cheeks.

“Yeah, of course it was my fault really… I was the one who was invading your space and-“

Before he could finish a thick book was slammed down on Zayn’s fingers causing him to splutter a curse and grab his hand continuing to curse under his breath glaring up at Mr Paterson who simply smirked and handed Niall his book politely.

“You two will be reading The Picture of Dorian Gray. You should be able to relate very well to the main character Mr Malik beauty and vanity, troubled youth. Niall if there are any problems with the partnership I’m sure Zayn would be happy to do it on his own” Zayn’s fingers tensed into a fist and muttered,  
“Bullshit-“ before Niall interrupted him,

“No that’s fine Mr P, Zayn’s a great partner.” He smiled a little and the teacher simply left.

“I’m a great partner huh?” Zayn smirked snidely raising a pierce brow causing Niall to blush and look down his blond hair tumbling in his eyes and he lets out a little chuckle.  
“Well you do know words like egotistical, so I figure you can’t be too horrible at English.”

It was Zayn’s turn to blush a bright red and he went back to nervously drumming his fingers over the desk.   
“Like I said, I’m sorry” He whispered softly then leaned over pushing the flower crown from his eyes giving a very faint smile felt something totally unlike guilt churn inside his stomach.

“But anyway, it turns out I do kind of related to the dude from the book, I’ve already read it so I’ll just wait for you to finish and they we can meet up some time”

Niall gave a little raise of his brow and muttered,  
“See, I told you I knew you were good a English, what’s it about?”

Zayn gave a long huff searching his memories.

“Well it’s about a boy who moves back to London after his father dies and this painter gets kind of obsessed with him and asks him to be his muse. Anyway the guy becomes almost enslaved by his looks own looks wondering when it will all fade. He starts going off the rails with smoking, drugs, sex. He’s lost in worry that he won’t be young forever so he essentially sells his soul so he’s young forever and never scars, then he becomes a monster and everything comes back to bit him in the arse… eventually” He scoffed.

To this Niall just looked up tilting his head to one side his brows furrowing in confusion. At first he holds it back but somehow it all ends up slipping and he softly asks,

“How is _that_ relatable?”

“It’s one of the most relatable things I’ve ever read,” Was all Zayn muttered and fidgeted with the pack of smokes in his back pocket. Niall seems to notice this too but says nothing,

“I don’t think you are as corrupt as you lead people to believe you know that?” He gave the smallest of smiles and rolls up his sleeves.   
“Well obviously you don’t know me very well” Was all he muttered picking up his books. The raven-haired boy looks to Niall for a small second when he sees that Niall’s hurt again his demeanour falls.

“Look, just meet me at my house Friday, I’ll text you the address.”   
Then he just walked off. He couldn’t take it. Niall Horan was fucking with his head.

~>>✤<<~

Friday came around and Zayn was left trying to make the house look presentable, he didn’t know exactly why he did care so much. He swears that the house hasn’t been cleaned since the last time his mother was over.

He remembered the day clearly because that was the first time in years his father hadn’t been in a drunken state. Zayn had mopped the hardwood floors while his father vacuumed the shag carpet in the living room and for a second he almost felt whole. Like for a split second there was a small chance of them being a real family again but as soon as his mother came and left things went back to normal and Zayn was left with a hole punched in his chest which was yet to be repaired.

He had just dug about ten years of dust from under the sofa along with several vodka bottles. He then tried to move the traffic light from in front of his study desk and lays it down on the bed having room no where else.

When the sound of a doorbell shattered him from his preparation his eyes flew to the clock and his heart skipped a beat, tensing in his chest.

Zayn’s feet moved before his head did and before he knew it he was standing at the front door trying to plaster a pleasant smile of his face.

He didn’t have to fake the smile when he saw the boy, standing in his baggy faded jeans and a plain white tee that hung loosely around his body. Today his hair was filled with roses and Zayn gave a little smirk muttering,  
“Where do you get all those flowers in London?”

Niall smiled widely and let out a little chuckle, “Do you like them? I remembered you liked roses so I kind of figured- anyway my mum owns a flower shop, so there’s kind of an abundance of them”

Zayn nodded slightly and ushered him into the house trying to steer clear of the spare room, where he had shoved all the junk he couldn’t find a place for and soon they were up in his room.

Niall’s eyes widened and he stood in the middle of Zayn’ s room then ran his hands over all the signs working his way around the room also glancing at his artwork.

“Elm Street… Give Way… Jimmy’s café and bar… Smith bu- Hey!”

Niall bust out in a fit of laughter doubling over his blue eyes lighting up and meeting Zayn’s,   
“What happened to ‘the school should be sign posted better’?”

At this point Zayn let out a little chuckle and ran his fingers though his hair shaking his head ever so slightly.

“Pretty witty, huh?” Niall gave a little nod covering his face with his hands,

“You are actually unbelievable… you know that?”

“Unbelievable good or unbelievable bad?”

“Unbelievable in the way you relate to probably the most unreliable fictional character ever… and you have a traffic light in your bedroom… how- what?”  
He giggled harder and it was utterly precious. He didn’t even know guys could giggle let alone do it like that.

“Well I’ll have you know he is very relatable for one he is realistic, I mean if you could be young forever _and_ chaise all your desires I’m pretty sure everyone would say yes to that.”  
As a reply Niall lays down on Zayn’s bed, the satin sheets shaping to his body he looked up at Zayn and shook his head slightly,

“I wouldn’t- no way. Being forever young just means being young and stupid forever and sex isn’t love, not always and I just can’t imagine wanting that.”

At the idea Zayn nodded slightly surprised when he found himself agreeing with the blond lad and lays down beside him casting a look over to him.

“You Horan are one in a hundred”

Niall looked over and nodded slightly, “Yep and don’t you forget it.”

Zayn scoffed at his sudden cockiness but again found himself bursting out laughing for no real reason.

“Anyway you didn’t answer my question, what’s with the traffic light and the street signs? That’s still illegal ‘ere right?”

Zayn rolled his eyes at the boy and nodded, “Yes Niall, otherwise it wouldn’t be fun.”  
“There are a lot of fun things that aren’t illegal.” he whispered softly then opened the book flipping through it and muttered softly,  
“So what themes do we want to do for this report?” He mumbled softly and Zayn sat up flicking though the text unable not to notice the fact Niall’s hip was slightly pressed against his and his on Niall’s.

“So there are the obvious options: mortality, youth, good verse evil, innocents or loss of it I suppose.”

Niall nodded and pulled out his notebook starting to write all those down every now and again glancing up at Zayn before adding,  
“To get a good grade we have to do something a little harder, less generic. Doing the ethics and morals will be hard but it’ll get us a better grade.”

“If you want a topic that will really impress than we should do sexuality” He smirked, this was odd really. He had never actually tried with assignments but he figured it was group work. He might be an arse but he wasn’t going to let Niall fail.   
“Sexuality? What do you right about that? He just made love with a lot of women.”

Zayn tried to right back laughter when the boy said ‘make love’ because honestly who under forty uses the term ‘make love’?

“Seriously? Where we reading the same book, yeah he ‘made love’ with a lot of birds but he also did it with lads as well and this was 1890 for god sakes.”

Niall looked up at the boy slightly wide eyed as if he had totally read over it,  
“What do you mean I don’t remember reading that anywhere.”

Zayn rolled his eyes and sat down reading over some of the quotes written in Niall’s notepad and softly read over the quote,

“Resist it, and your soul grows sick with longing for the things it has forbidden to itself, with desire for what its monstrous laws have made monstrous and unlawful.”

Niall raised a brow and whispered, “I still don’t get it,”

“Oscar Wilde was gay, that’s pretty much proven so if you read between the lines… it just-“ He huffed softly almost wanting to whisper ‘it takes on to know one’ but held it back.

“It’s just fairly obvious and it shows you have background on the author and stuff as well”

Niall nodded and just like that it seemed the afternoon fell away from them. Before long he could hear his father’s foot falls from downstairs and froze looking over at Niall,  
“I think you better go” He whispered helping Niall gather all of his things and led him downstairs.

His father looked over at Zayn, then Niall his stance slightly swaying from one side to the next. It was obvious he was drunk- again.

“Who’s this then?”

His fathers voice was stern and Zayn could see Niall viably tense beside him. One of his father’s best attributes was causing people to fear him.

“Since when to do care?” He scoffed venom leaking into his voice,

“It’s not like any of it matters to you right? You’re never home in the first place why do you care so much who’s in the house?”

“Because I’m your father, I deserve to know who’s under my roof”

 At this Zayn cast an apologetic look over at Niall and took a few deep breaths biting back the fight that had been rising in his chest for over ten years, it was a damn long build up and he let it all slip out.   
“You’re not my father. You’re a sperm donor. Mum taught me how to walk, talk, and how to be kind. I taught myself how to cook, drive, how to shave and fucking everything else a father should do. All you did was teach me what type of fucked up twats there are in the world!” By this point he was screaming.

Niall looked shocked to say the least but his eyes were filled with a kind of sadness,   
“Zayn, maybe I should leave” he whispered shyly before slowly backing out the door before whispering,   
“I’ll call you and we can meet up later yeah?”

He didn’t wait for an answer he was already gone.

Zayn glared over at his father who still looked utterly shocked then watched the rage bubble behind his dark eyes, they reflected Zayn’s own and the sudden realisation was shocking.  
“Listen here you little prick” his father curse grabbing his arm and twisting it back slightly.

“You’re right, I’m not you’re father therefore I shouldn’t have to keep a roof over your sorry head- the worst part is you think you are better than me but you are exactly like me. Cigarettes, spliff, they did the same to your mind state lungs and booze do to my liver, you are a hypercritical twerp just like you’re mother.”

Zayn would say it felt like he had been punch hand in the stomach but before the blow of his words could settle in he felt his father hit him square in the jaw and whimpered scrubbing his face then balled his hands into fists.

“You’re wrong” He spat through tears, spitting blood from his mouth letting his fist fall,

“I’m nothing like you, but I’m nothing like mum either. I’m not going to stick around here and let you treat me like shit.”

Just like that he ran upstairs, tears flowing freely down his cheeks. He wasn’t even thinking. His hands just shoved random items into a bag and once it was filled he slung it over his shoulders, feeling so weak that the mere weight of his backpack made his knees quiver from beneath him.

He caught a glance of himself in the mirror, eyes wild and frightened all at once, eyes that mirrored the same as his father’s. His fists clenched and he slammed his fist into the mirror slicing his hand open though was too numb to feel it.

He sprinted down the stairs, out the front door and out into the London city streets.

His feet moved pounding on the sidewalk ice-cold air cutting into his body causing him to cringe still sobbing as he stumbled along. His shaking fingers fiddle with a cigarette he needed one, really needed one.

 He smoked slowly, fingers shaking. He was nothing like his father. Nothing.

Then he thought of Louis always trying to better his father even though he hated the man and Zayn wondered it he was doing the same. It wasn’t long before the cigarette was burnt to the nub and he lit the next spending what felt like an eternity on the sidewalk sobbing.

He hated himself for that, crying. He hated the fact that he let himself get so effect, so invested in his father that he would let himself slip so far into a form of despair. It wasn’t the fact that he had been hit; it was the sinking feeling after, the dejection.

He was about to light his third cigarette letting all the poisonous air dance around in his lungs when his fathers words echoed around in his head again.

‘You’re just like me’

His muscles tensed and he stood flinging his pack at an abandoned storefront and furrowed his brow seeing that it was a flower shop. Hadn’t Niall said something about- no it was too much of a coincidence.

He moved his shaking body to peer inside seeing a light brown haired boy, slightly older than himself in the very back packing everything up. He recognised the face. His whole body tensed. Most of the time Zayn wasn’t the kind of guy to believe in any form of fate, we made our own decisions anything after was just good luck or timing.

He furrowed his brow and slowly snaked his was around to the back alley of the building. He jumped up to grab the fire escape and shimmied up the ladder.

He was used to this from countless times of sneaking into the Tomlinson’s flat. He reached the third floor and peered into a window catching the eyes ,bluer than the sky, his mouth hung slightly agape as he scrambled over opening the window.

“Zayn? What are you doing here? What happened to your hand and your jaw?”

He let the boy into his room as he almost fell flat on his face. Niall helped him get inside letting him sit down on the small twin sized bed. His eyes were totally lost his mind scatter-brained.

“I just kind of ended up here,” he whispered numbly.

“I remember you said you had a flower shop and well my dad did this-“

He brushed his fingers of his jawbone cringing slightly as the pain started to thrive and throb then looked down at his hand sticky with dried blood.

“That’s from me,” he whispered softly.

What had possessed him to come here? What is his right mind had told him to go to Niall of all people? Louis would probably have called him a pussy for crying then just get pissed at the world, after Zayn told him what happen as he did quiet often and encourage Zayn to break things. This was a good method most of the time but not tonight, tonight he felt utterly drained and he just wanted to sleep and be held by someone- anyone.

“Y-your dad?” At first Niall seemed shocked up then tried to compose himself.

“I’m sorry. Is he like that all the time?”

To this Zayn gave a weak nod and Niall huffed sitting down beside him and sighed softly taking Zayn’s bleeding hand and looked it over,  
“I don’t think it needs stiches but it definitely needs a bandage, I’ll go get a first aid kit.”

Niall was about to leave but Zayn’s wounded are reached out and grabbed him trying to pull him back. His hands moved without his head realising what was going on.   
“Don’t… I mean- you don’t have to do that. I have been a total arse hole to you ever since you go here. You shouldn’t be helping me.”

Niall came back shooting him a soft smiled and took a step closer,

“You weren’t an arse hole today. Not even close. You never were really, you just like to play it up like you are so people don’t get too close but that’s the one thing you really want right? For people to get close.”

He leaned down and pecked his lips sighing softly and this caused Zayn’s whole body to tense, he didn’t know what to do. For a second he sat frozen in utter shock before melting into the kiss. It probably lasted a little over a minute but it felt like an eternity. Niall smelt like roses mixed with soap and soil after rain. It was an intoxicating mix that filled his nostrils and caused him to melt into it. His own fingers twisting into Niall’s hair then slowly felt his fingers brush over the crown of roses still placed on his head. He moved closer as if his life depended on it, as if the closer he got the more his head cleared, the more he felt alive, the more he left at home and most of all the more he felt loved.

When Niall pulled back he took several shaky breaths his heart thudding loud in his hears as he heard the boy’s Irish accent fill his ears.  

“Okay lets get you all fixed up, yeah?”

~>>✤<<~

Zayn had always said revenge was a dish best served with reinforcements.

This revenge came ta month after being kicked out of his home. He had since moved in with the Tomlinson family. Truthfully it had been a hell of a lot better than his house despite sometimes being pestered by Louis’s younger siblings and the fact that there was never enough hot water to go around. If nothing else it was a home, not just a cold empty house but Zayn had been missing his room, the street signs that had been collected over the years now seemed to go to waste, not to mention Louis’s traffic light, which he had been royally pissed to hear was still in his father’s flat.

So after weeks of planning, revenge had come on the Friday afternoon before the Christmas Holidays. Louis, Zayn, Niall, Harry and Liam all stood outside his father’s flat rugged up, half in sweaters half in leather jackets.

 Louis was Zayn’s partner in crime, his right hand man so to speak where as Niall had surprisingly ask if he could come. For a second Zayn was worried about his influence on the innocent, blond haired lad but was quickly assured this would be a one-time thing.

As for Harry, Louis had dragged him along saying that he could be useful considering he was the tallest and therefore could help get Zayn into the second story window but the true was the two boys had been inspirable since they had started dating. Liam was really there just to keep everyone in line and make sure they didn’t get arrested, which was always useful when committing a crime.

Zayn led the other lads to his window and looked upwards at it feeling a surge of bad memories come rushing back on him with a tidal wave of emotions.

Louis was already working on his part of the plan, considering it really was Louis’s plan. Zayn let him have free creative rein knowing that Louis had a kind of a mean streak for revenge.   
“First off we go with the classics,” he noted smirking.

He then passed out several rolls of toilet paper, egg carton and spray cans around,

“Isn’t this a little retro?” Zayn chuckled causing Louis to glare at him,  
“They are classics for a reason Malik, respect the greats”

With that he chuckled slightly and pelted an egg at Zayn’s bedroom window shattering the glass with a crack. He handed an egg to Harry who looked dubiously to start with but then picked it up and flung it smashing it into the side of the house looking back at Zayn giving a small smirk.

The all took their turn pelting eggs at the house making a game out of it, whoever could get it through the window first got to keep the traffic light.

Louis pelted it into the room at let you a little yep when it actually went through holding his hands up with success and cheered loudly. He then got Harry to boost him through the window.

“Be careful Boo” Harry warned causing Louis to smirk and kiss the younger boy.

“Always am” He assured and Zayn poked his tongue out at the two,  
“You guys are discussing”

“Oh yeah, says the one who reads poetry and works with his boyfriend in a flower shop, snogging in the rose garden in your spare time. Don’t think I haven’t seen it Malik we’ve all seen it.”

Louis shot back then grabbed the traffic light walking over and peering down at them, smiling and throwing it down at Harry who caught it and took it to the back of Liam’s truck.

“Zayn?” Niall muttered softly beside him resting his head on his boyfriends shoulder giving a little smile,

“How does one steel a traffic light?”

Zayn chuckled softly at this and shook his head ever so slightly,

“Maybe one day Louis will show you.”

To this Niall raised a brow and looked over at him playing with his hands mindlessly.

“What you’ve given up your life of crime?”

He laugh, that laugh sending Zayn’s whole body into a sense of yearning and he softly looked down at the blond boy with the laughing blue eyes and the assortment of flowers twisted into his sand meets shore hair.

“Not entirely, but someone once told me that there are a lot of fun things that aren’t illegal and I’m looking forward to seeing them.”  
“I’m looking forward to showing you.”


End file.
